Scarlet Teardrops
by Lanie M
Summary: PostHBP Harry is on a mission, and finds something unexpected in the darkness. Draco bleeds.


Disclaimer: The HP series and relevant characters belong to JK Rowling. Harry and Draco do not belong to me.

Warnings: Angst and more angst. Hints of slash – though I think it's more of an analysis of Draco than anything.

Notes: After reading HBP, Draco transformed in my mind. When I wrote this fic, I had in mind the bathroom crying scene, and Draco's frantic hesitation at the end of the book. I don't know whether this will really happen to him, but I do think it's plausible that Draco would run away, if worst came to worst. The mental image of this Draco was heartwrenching to me, and at the spur of the moment I just felt like I needed to put it into words. So here you are.

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**SCARLET TEARDROPS**

The cave was dark, cold, its walls crumbling under the touch of faltering footsteps and tentative breaths. As Harry moved he listened to the reverberating echoes of his body, clutching his rucksack and wand in his weary grasp, aware of the warmth of the sunset and the calling of his unfinished journey, the dangers awaiting him, the urgency of the mission at hand.

But Harry was tired, and as he stepped into the cave, he mused briefly that sleep was the closest state to blissful oblivion, the nearest thing to heaven any living being would ever reach.

Harry squinted into the darkness before him, and there was a shuffling, a moan, a silence. Harry froze, instinctively raising his illuminated wand with perfect poise.

"Who's there?" he yelled.

He waited. A stiffness began to permeate the air. Harry was too experienced to be fooled.

"I know you're there!" he shouted, subconsciously blocking out a tinge of fear. "Come out, now! Show yourself!"

The sliver of light from his wand twitched vaguely. Harry stared unblinking at the figure in the distance, now stepping slowly and seemingly strenuously into the light. The figure shivered, then was still.

And there he was. Harry stared at the streaks of platinum, the glimmers of gold and white and silver, clinging and cascading lifelessly down the torn surface of his shoulders, at the patterns of bruises deforming the paper-like shell of his face, at his shrivelled hands and shrunken legs and inert immobility. Harry stared and stared, until he could stare no more, at the diminished form positioned before him.

"Draco Malfoy." he breathed.

It was not a question, nor was it a statement. The words were neither here nor there, unnecessary, useless. They vanished like the hollowness under Draco's eyes.

Draco did not respond. Unconsciously, Harry lowered his wand, let down his guard. He did not wonder whether it was pity, or disgust, or shock, or utter disorientation. In that moment, Harry did not think of consequences, or tactics, or appropriate actions. He did not remember his training, or his instincts. At that moment, Harry saw Draco Malfoy, and did not know what to do.

There was blood on Draco's face, smeared over Draco's ripped robes, a crimson sea dripping from the arm on which Harry could make out the razor-slit outline of the Dark Mark, now almost indistinguishable from the open scars and gashes on Draco's skin. And when their eyes met, Harry knew he would give anything to see the old Draco Malfoy, the Draco Malfoy who smirked and sneered and sniggered, who spat his name with contempt and filled the two syllables of "Potter" with more hatred and venom than he had ever thought possible. For an instant, Harry wished for the Draco Malfoy he could mock and hate, the one who was prepared and pampered and not wandless, who ran away from death and not towards it, the one who did not compel him to feel such an indescribable and inexplicable, heartwrenching pain.

Harry could see everything in Draco's eyes. He could see the fear, and the doubt, and the anger; the despair, and the desire, and the indifference. Harry knew the questions that Draco wanted to ask, the words that Draco would never say. He had expected Draco to curse, to swear, to throw punches and insults at him – but all that remained now was silence.

"What are you doing here?" Harry spoke.

Draco did not answer, and fleetingly Harry wondered whether Draco could speak at all, whether his wounds, both visible and invisible, were too deep and excruciating to bear. He turned back to the darkness, but Harry reached for his arm, an attempt to pull him back into the light.

When Draco recoiled sharply, Harry staggered back.

"Get off me." he hissed. "Get the fuck off me."

It seemed like an extraordinary effort on Draco's part. He had barely forced the words, coughing and spluttering, wincing in anguish. Harry looked around for his wand, knocked accidentally from his fingers and hiding in a corner by the worn cave wall. Draco watched, and much to Harry's incomprehensible comfort, he scoffed a whisper of a scoff.

"Do it." he said.

Harry stood motionless.

"Come on, do it." Draco repeated, shifting slightly forwards. "I know you want to. I know you've dreamed of it, that you've wanted to finish me off from day one. Do it. There's nothing stopping you. It's just you and me, and you're the one with the wand. Do it."

He paused.

"Kill me." he finished, his eyelids shaking in what seemed a whirlwind of bitterness, desperation, and what Harry thought was something entirely different.

The silence dragged on for what seemed an eternity, enveloping them like an epidemic of lost pasts and relentless futures. Harry watched the scarlet teardrops falling from Draco's trembling fingers, forming a mirror of blood wine on the dust of the floor, reflecting everything and nothing.

"I won't kill you." Harry said finally.

Draco looked up, and all of a sudden, something in the emptiness of his steel grey orbs faltered and flickered, like the shattered shards of hope and love, of the faith which had long been left broken within him. And for a strange reason Harry could not understand, Harry recognized the Draco who wavered in his eyes before they reverted to the fearful defeat they had now become.

"You coward." he heaved.

And when Harry saw the glint of the blood-stained razor blade concealed in the depths of Draco's pocket, reflecting the veil of dark lesions which would never be dark enough to hide the shadows etched, mark by mark, on his soul, when Harry felt the apathetic frailty of Draco's voice, nothing in comparison to the bottomless grief of buried downfall - Harry wanted to tell Draco. He wanted to tell Draco that he was sorry, sorry for his scars, for the way his life had turned out: a life of privilege and perfection, reduced inevitably to nothing but fear and failure and loneliness, a life of forced darkness and forbidden light. He wanted to tell Draco that he was sorry for everything he had and had not done, for the hatred and the confusion and everything he had taken for granted. But most of all, Harry was sorry for all the words he had left unsaid, sorry he had not stepped forward and embraced Draco in that distant bathroom all those years ago, before the battle and bloodshed had begun, and wiped all his tears away.

But Harry did not say a thing. The words were lost, sealed and receding in a past of pure simplicity which seemed nothing more than a non-existent illusion.

Draco stood, and for the first and last time, Harry recognized the situation for what it really was: two individuals standing on opposite sides of the same coin, alone, marked, condemned by destiny, like the battle between good and evil, like the almost indiscernible line between hate and love.

And Harry knew that nothing coulddefeat the forces of destiny.

He picked up his wand and brushed it on his sleeve. He stared out at the stars which were now beginning to scatter in the skies, and thought of the endless nights Draco must have spent here in hiding, with nothing but the aloof chill of the moon as his company. And without a word, he turned to leave.

When Draco spoke, Harry did not turn back. It mattered not whether Draco called him by his first name, or uttered words which meant something he had never heard, or whether this was truly goodbye. Harry knew that words would never be enough.

"Sorry, Harry." Draco said.

And just as Harry did not see the teardrop that pierced a line from Draco's eye, Draco did not see the smile which radiated across Harry's features before he stepped back into light beyond the cave, and was gone forever.


End file.
